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Part of the process of preparing a well for further drilling, production or abandonment, cementing a well is the procedure of developing and pumping cement into place in a wellbore.

Used for a number of different reasons, cementing protects and seals the wellbore. Most commonly, cementing is used to permanently shut off water penetration into the well. Part of the completion process of a prospective production well, cementing can be used to seal the annulus after a casing string has been run in a wellbore. Additionally, cementing is used to seal a lost circulation zone, or an area where there is a reduction or absence of flow within the well. In directional drilling, cementing is used to plug an existing well, in order to run a directional well from that point. Also, cementing is used to plug a well to abandon it.

Cementing is performed when the cement slurry is deployed into the well via pumps, displacing the drilling fluids still located within the well, and replacing them with cement. The cement slurry flows to the bottom of the wellbore through the casing, which will eventually be the pipe through which the hydrocarbons flow to the surface. From there it fills in the space between the casing and the actual wellbore, and hardens. This creates a seal so that outside materials cannot enter the well flow, as well as permanently positions the casing in place.